


much of her grace is in her frailty

by Sadhippie



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Jon critical, Just to be safe, Ned critical, Sansa Stark-centric, not Dany friendly, targcest baby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-30
Updated: 2020-04-30
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:43:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23918497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sadhippie/pseuds/Sadhippie
Summary: And there he is. Covered in ash and blood offering her his Targaryen babe. Begging her to take it.And for once, a Tully woman has a choice.
Relationships: Jon Snow/Sansa Stark
Comments: 81
Kudos: 337





	much of her grace is in her frailty

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING: I wouldn’t call this anti-Jon, but I understand some of you might think so, so just for safety I’m leaving this here. Also, if you think it was Catelyn’s obligation to raise Jon as her own child, this is also not for you.
> 
> The title is from Victor Hugo.

“ _You’re alive_ …” she whispers in relief at the sight of him. His hair unbound, his face bloody, but _alive_. She could almost weep, but then she looks down towards his hands and loses her breath.

“She’s dead,” he tells her.

His eyes are bloodshot, and she cannot know if it is from grief or all the ash he must have waded through. She knows nothing, truly. Nothing at all as she looks into the purple eyes of the Dragon Queen’s babe as it is offered to her. The begging arms of Jon Snow stretched out to deliver it onto _her_. Its mother’s enemy. Its father’s…

"Sansa... I cannot... Please."

She’s shaking her head. She does not look at it long enough. Not nearly long enough or she wouldn't have been able to make herself steel. But she saw the wisps of white hair, though it is covered in blood having been ripped from its mother's womb. And she saw a body so small… Sansa knows not how it breathes. And she cannot bear to be here long enough to hear its cry, to know if it lives despite its tainted blood. His rotten Targaryen blood.

Her hands are trembling. She takes her shaking fingers to her lips in an effort to... In an effort to... She does not know. Her heart is shattered and for once – since she has regained control of her House, of her body – she does not know what to do.

"I cannot..." it is all he is able to whisper. Again, and again and again. And she cannot bear the sight of him. Of his shame. Of his weakness. "I cannot do this _without you_. Please." _Her_ shame. _Her_ weakness. “ _Take him_.”

And all she can _see_ is her mother. Her _beautiful_ mother. Her high cheekbones. Her auburn hair. Her gentle hands. Her blue gowns.

All she can _think_ of is of a child with the Tully colouring on her breast as she welcomed her traitorous husband home, his bastard on the arms of a wet-nurse.

Sansa wonders if Eddard Stark begged. She wonders if the second son of Rickard Stark and Lyarra Stark begged his Tully bride to keep his bastard in Winterfell’s halls. And yet, she knows he did not. Stark men do not beg. He _commanded_. And he must have growled when Catelyn Tully, the most dutiful wife asked of her husband’s mistress. Other women would have killed Jon. Poisoned him in the night. Cared not for him during a fever. But not her mother, Catelyn Tully had simply avoided him and all the threat he brought to her own children. The would-be King in the North.

And there stands Sansa Stark and the Gods spare her _nothing_.

“She was barren, she was _so_ certain. I never… It was always… _You know_ it was always…” He cannot even bring himself to say it. Not with her blood on his hands. Not with her child on his arms. For Jon is an _honourable_ man, above all. And Sansa is a _dutiful_ woman and doesn’t he rely on it. “ _Please Sansa_ , take him.”

If he commanded her it would have been easier. If he commanded her she would have known what to say. How to deny him. And yet he begs, and he brings forth things they have kept hidden, glances they have shared, feelings she has shamed herself for and he reveals his own in an effort for her to take his child. And it’s the indignity of it all. It is agony of what could have been. Of what will _never_ be that makes her want to scratch her chest raw.

"Tell me what to do. Tell me what can I do? He is my son... " he begs her, his voice strangled, his eyes filled with tears.

" _And I am not his mother_ ," she snarls before she can stop herself.

She brings a hand to her covered chest, glad for the fabric. For one more layer to protect herself with.

"I have spilled enough blood to drown myself in. I cannot let it touch _my child_ ," he manages to say though she can hear how he struggles with it. How his tongue wrestles against the words. How he fights against the knowledge that he is a father now. That he has bloodied his hands with the blood of his child’s mother, no matter how cruel she was.

 _Oh, but so were hers_. Her hands were drenched with blood. Mostly her own.

She takes a step back and closes her eyes for a moment, for she cannot say it in the face of someone she had once placed above herself. "How do you stand it? How does the shame not bring you to your knees at what you ask of me... At what you ask of Catelyn Tully’s daughter."

“He’s just a child. An innocent child. I was just a child,” he manages to say though he looks away from her.

Sansa would laugh if she knew how.

“Whatever crimes my mother might have been guilty of, I have paid for in full,” she whispers and tastes the blood on her tongue. Hears Petyr on her ear calling her _Cat_. Sees her aunt Lysa falling into the sky. Remembers apologising for things she has never done.

"I gave you everything I had to give. I made you a Stark. I made you a King. I kept you alive. I have nothing more to give. _Do you understand?_ I have _nothing_ more to give you. I will not be brought down to my knees because you could not offer me the small mercy of asking Arya instead of me. I will not humiliate myself any further for you."

He keeps shaking his head as if her words bear no meaning. As if once more she will bend for him. "I did not know. I did not know. I need you. I have only loved-" _And the rage consumes her._

She cannot abide by this betrayal. Had he begged for her protection. Had he begged for her mercy. She would have given it in full. She would have cried herself to sleep and smiled during the day, but she would have delivered it to him, like she had so many times before. She would have begged for the North’s clemency for his betrayal. Would have argued for mercy to keep the last Targaryen alive after all the bloodshed they have caused. She would have forgiven him. But that is not what he asks of her. He comes to ask for what is left of her pride and Sansa Stark has nothing more to give him. Her heart is empty, and her hands are full.

" _I owe you nothing_." But she cannot stop there. Not when her heart is breaking. Not when it was him who shattered it. Again, and again as he took that woman to bed in an attempt at some kind of hollow peace that could never be achieved. Not while he was certain of her love for him. Not when he _relied_ on it. " _My mother_ owed you nothing. It is no woman's duty to bear another woman's child," she growls though it shakes from her lips. Though she tastes copper and salt on her tongue. Though she knows her fingernails are filled with her own blood against her palms. Though she knows she will not allow herself to eat for days because of it.

She wants to howl with the grief of it. Wants to howl for his arms are still stretched out and he cries silent tears as he keeps on hoping that she will take the babe from his hands, that she will cradle it in hers, that she will make herself a mother for his convenience. She wishes he would scream. She wishes he would rage so that she might as well. But he only cries, and Sansa has no more tears left.

He manages to fight his tears into submission, to steady is voice.

“I promised myself I would never sire a bastard. That I would never condemn a child to the life I had,” he confesses as though he seeks absolution. As if Jon Snow and Eddard Stark are no fathers worth having and it falls to the Tully women to bear the burden. As though this is her choice and hers alone.

As though the responsibility is not only his. As if she had not warned him. As if she had forced him to bed the Dragon Queen. To bend the knee to her and give the North away to a Targaryen. To follow her into Kingslanding. To wade through the fire and the blood the ruthless woman left in her path. To drive the sword through her heart and take from her womb a child no one knew existed. As if it were her actions and not theirs that had ensued the babe on his arms. A babe not even he felt comfortable holding.

And yet, somehow, his future depends on _her_. Depends on Sansa Stark’s duty to raise a child that is not her own. As though this babe is a consequence of her actions, of her sins, as if a Targaryen babe is something she has to contend with. For she is Sansa Stark and she must prove with her every step, with her every breath, that she is loyal to her family, that she is deserving of the Stark name. As if this is her duty. As if this is her punishment for having the Tully features. For bearing her mother’s face and whatever sins they feel the need to place upon her.

Sansa takes a deep breath, cleans away whatever tears rolled from her eyes and finally looks upon the child, the barely noticeable rise and fall of his tiny chest. 

“I am not my mother,” she tells him. Watches as his eyes brighten with hope at the misunderstanding of her words and then she walks away.

_Unlike her, she has a choice._

**Author's Note:**

> The quarantine makes me very angsty and because of one of my other fics I had to consider what Sansa would do if she was confronted with the magical Targaryen baby and I’m not of the opinion that she has to pay or make right for Catelyn’s supposed “sins”.
> 
> I had this written for quite some time and was too afraid of the reaction to publish it sooner. Nevertheless, I couldn’t let go of it, so here it is. I understand not everyone agrees on this particular subject and that’s perfectly okay. Anyway, thank you so much for reading.


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